Minors fleeing violence or poverty in their native country sometimes travel without parents, tagging along with others. Some manage to fly to Canada and enter the United States through the northern border. Others must connect with smugglers who lead groups to the Mexican border before handing them off to a different runner.

That’s was the reality for the more than 2,000 unaccompanied minors placed in homes by the state in 2018.

Representatives from area nonprofits and the state Department of Children & Families last week held a panel discussion at Unitarian Church in Westport focusing on human trafficking and unaccompanied minors. The panelists, from Connecticut Institute for Refugees and Immigrants, the Connecticut Coalition Against Trafficking, Love146 and the Department of Children & Families, started by discussing unaccompanied minors or children younger than 18 who enter the United States without legal immigration status and don’t have a parent or guardian present.

The children are often apprehended by an immigration official at the border after traveling hundreds or thousands of miles with others also fleeing their country.

Many travel to the United States after witnessing violence, sex assault, forced labor and other hardships. Some children are victimized on their trip to America. Most unaccompanied minors are hoping to reunite with a family member or guardian already living in America. A classic situation is a child’s family member dies in their native country and the only relatives the minor has left are living in the U.S.

The problem is, the child and the sponsor often haven’t seen each other in years, said William Rivera director of multicultural affairs and immigration practice at the Department of Children & Families. Often, the “sponsor” doesn’t have the child’s best interest at heart with many surreptitiously posing as the child’s family member, when they in fact, are not. In those situations, the Department of Children & Families investigates by requesting DNA, for example.

These minors are cared for by the Department of Health and Human Services until they’re granted immigration relief or deported.

The average age of unaccompanied minors traveling to Connecticut is between 14 and 17, and some arrive pregnant or as young as 1-year-old, said Alicia Kinsman, a staff attorney at Connecticut Institute for Refugees and Immigrants. If officials are unable to ascertain the child’s age, medical examinations like bone scans are requested. Often, the child is tasked with finding a lawyer to handle their case once they reach the United States.

On average, a trip costs the sponsor about $7,000 per child and the minors are expected to work and pay back the sponsor. As a result, many are at risk for labor exploitation or domestic servitude.

Police often call the Department of Children & Families to report a child working late at a restaurant and teachers call to say one of their students is sleeping in class after working all night.

“We have hundreds of those cases,” said Rivera of the DCF. The experience leads some children to request deportation back to their country, he said.

“Working with refugees and immigrants like any other vulnerable populations has never been easy but it is certainly more difficult now than any other time in history,” Kinsman said. “There is a dominance of myth over fact and all of that is contributing to fear — and the current administration hasn’t done much to correct it,” she said.

Her clients are terrified of deportation.

“For them that doesn’t just mean the inconvenience of detention or being ripped from your home or sent to a place with less employment opportunity, but it means they’re sent back to a place where they left running,” Kinsman said. Many won’t call police or peruse immigration relief. Some let protective orders lapse because they fear interaction with the government — or even her, their attorney.

“When you’re dealing with vulnerable populations who are already voiceless, this climate heightens all of that and they are so terrified of coming forward or asking for help,” Kinsman said.

The recent government shut down led to a backlog of cases in the immigration court system, she said. She pointed to thousands of immigrants who had court hearings canceled amid the recent federal goverment shutdown and now must wait two to three years for another court date.

“It’s been more difficult to engage families and get them to trust us,” he said. “In most cases we really don’t want to take your child, we want to get them services.”

Leonela Cruz Ahuatl of the Connecticut Coalition Against Trafficking said some of her clients won’t answer her calls or are scared to open the door when she visits. Some minors placed in Connecticut are nowhere to be found when she calls to check on them, and others will move to another state from fear of deportation.

The forum also looked at risk factors that contribute to human trafficking among at-risk American youth. Cynthia Melendez, a survivor and social worker at Love146, said social media has made it easier for perpetrators to traffic local youth. Victims often run away, isolate themselves or show up at home with gifts such as another cell phone from an unknown source. Secretive, compulsive texting with a stranger could indicate the child is being trafficked, she said.

“We’re in between Boston and New York with cross-cutting highways that are frequently travel ways and we are a wealthy state,” Kinsman said. “There are factors here that make it worthwhile for traffickers to operate here. Many diplomats live here and that’s been an unfortunate pipeline for victims here too.”

One man attending the event asked how he or the community could help, and Kinsman said raising awareness about human trafficking is a good first step. People can support nonprofit organizations that fight against human trafficking or donate money, food, clothing or their time to local organizations, she said.

The Department of Children & Families has a care line people can call if they suspect human trafficking at 800-842 2288. The National Human Trafficking Resource Center has a tip line at 888-373-7888.